Love Cruelties
by Foxyinthecity
Summary: Love can be wonderful, but love can have its cruelties. Written for Wedjatqui and inspired by her fic Intentional Cruelties. A sequel to that fic.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimers: Firstly, I do not own any rights to Stargate Atlantis. I make no profit from this endeavor.

Title: Love Cruelties

Episodes: None

Summary: Love can be wonderful, but love can have its cruelties.

Characters: John, Teyla, Ronon, and others.

Comments: This fic was inspired by one of my favorite writers, Wedjatiq's and her fic, Intentional Cruelties. I really love that fic. And I was asked by Jeyla4ever to write something for Wedjatqi sort of in conjunction with the Beya Secret Elf on LJ. Here is my present to you Wedjatqi. Sorry that it is belated!

Ronon looked at the scene in the Infirmary with interest. The Infirmary's beds that had been recently filled to capacity with many of the affected women were slowly emptying. Teyla was one of those women however she had been isolated from the other. It had taken her the longest to gain consciousness. She had been heavily sedate than the other women because of the risk she had posed. He and Sheppard were here now to visit her since they had gotten words they were bringing her out of the sedation.

He saw Sheppard frowned when he saw that Kanaan was at Teyla's bedside holding the unusual passive Torren in his arms. He knew that Sheppard's frown was not for Torren, but for Torren's father. Sheppard's apparent disapproval of Kanaan wasn't hard to miss to him. He knew Sheppard hadn't made any real effort to get to know Kanaan since Kanaan's arrival on Atlantis and his presence back into Teyla's life. He also knew Sheppard hadn't been rude to the guy or anything like that in fact Sheppard had pretty much been pleasant whenever he found himself in Kanaan's company on those rare occasions. But, he could see that Sheppard only tolerate Kanaan because he had to. And he knew Sheppard's feelings for Teyla was the cause or maybe the fact that Sheppard seemed to genuinely do liked the guy. Sheppard did however didn't want to upset Teyla. But it was pretty obvious to him the man was walking a tight rope between his feelings for Teyla and his negative feelings toward Kanaan.

He had been present when Teyla first told Sheppard about her pregnancy and it was evident to him back then that Sheppard's anger about Teyla not telling him about her pregnancy sooner was not the only thing fueling his anger. He suspected that was a hard blow to Sheppard. Teyla's news had made Sheppard see that love was on borrowed time. That was one of love cruelties. The ambers of love needed to be claimed, they needed to be stroke. Love can be like the surf. The waves of the sea as they break on the shoreline, to only return to the waiting sea. And once, Kanaan was back in Teyla's life, Sheppard had experienced that surf. Sheppard began to live one of those cruelties of love – watching another man living a life that could have, in his opinion, easily have been his own. He knew Teyla's relationship with Kanaan had caused some form of emotional pain for Sheppard. That pain Sheppard kept well hidden from almost everyone, but he could see it. Just as he also knew Sheppard wouldn't try to come between Teyla and Kanaan, not intentionally at any rate. But that didn't stop him from thinking that Sheppard would play a major part in the survival of Teyla's relationship with Kanaan for in his heart he knew Teyla and Sheppard belonged together. They were two halves of a coin, different on either sides, but the same.

For him Sheppard and Teyla were his closest friends even though he had other friends here now. But he had long come to realize that he considered Sheppard and Teyla the closest thing to a _family, _the family he no longer had. They were his family now and he would give up his life willing for them, with no thought or afterthought, for them and even for McKay. He had spent most of his time with the two of them and McKay. And it was obvious to him from the beginning that there was something more between Sheppard and Teyla besides their friendship. And the time he had spent with them had only confirmed his initial thoughts. Yet the two of them seem oblivious of the other affection. Maybe they had chosen not to see it or to acknowledge their feelings, while he and he certain others as seen it also. He had heard stories of Lt. Bates accusations about Teyla conspiring with the Wraith and his accusations at Sheppard. Bates was a lucky man he hadn't been on Atlantis then.

But he had never been able to forget that conversation he had with Sheppard about Teyla on the day that Teyla was badly injured and _the day_ they lost the original Carson. That day and the days after were hard on everyone. His and Sheppard's conversation was interrupted by the blast that injured Teyla and killed Dr. Hewston, and a few others. And his subtle attempts to question both Sheppard and Teyla since about a possible relationship between the two of them were answered by both with denials and dismissals. Yet, he had thought it was a matter of time until something eventually would happen and that maybe they will honest with themselves and each other. Because truthfully, he didn't understand why they had chosen this path they were on, to have that someone that your heart yearn for above others, yet risk losing them by fears, fears that held them back; cause those two had serious fears issues. Love can be wonderful, but love can have its cruelties. He knows all too well of love cruelties. There were not too many things he regretted in his life, but his greatest regret is that he didn't forced Melena to leave the planet with the others. For his love for Melena hadn't pale or dimmer in these many years since her death. That love was there apart of him and apart of his heart. It was his to keep forever. Ronon sighed to see were his thoughts had taken him, bittersweet memories.

Ronon focused back his attention to Sheppard. Sheppard sure didn't look all that relax and they were almost by Teyla's bedside now. Teyla saw them coming and smiled, but then she frowned as if she thought of something and it troubled her. He saw out the corner of his eye Sheppard smile too, but Sheppard's eyes told a different story to him. Teyla really did have a great smile. Lately, she hasn't smile all that much. He wondered if she even realizes that.

"John, Ronon!"

"Look who's awake." Sheppard said teasingly to Teyla.

Ronon noticed Kanaan stiffen as he smiled politely at them. "Colonel Sheppard, Ronon." He and Sheppard both acknowledged the Athosian man's presence.

Ronon found himself asking Teyla, "How're feeling?"

"Well, I feel fine, but my head still does hurt a little." Teyla half smiled at them.

"Teyla do you wish for me take Torren and bring him back later to see you?" Kanaan asked.

"No Kanaan. I want to see my son. You can give him to me if wish." Teyla held out her hands to take Torren. Torren went willingly into her arms. Teyla moved over a little so she could place Torren next to her on the bed then hugged him to her body. Ronon watched as Sheppard said something to Torren and the boy smiled. Kanaan seemed hold himself a little bit rigidly as he watched Sheppard tease Torren.

"How are the others?" Ronon heard Teyla asked them.

"Most of the women including Dr. Keller have checked out fine." John informed her. Teyla seemed to relax upon hearing news. Teyla looked thoughtful for just a moment.

"Did we do any serious damage to the city's systems? Was anyone injured?"

"Nah." He retorted.

"No and no. We were able to take back control of the city before any real security protocol was broken. The entity that was in you, she seemed to be the leader. She was the hardest to get to contain." Sheppard advised Teyla. Ronon watched Sheppard frowned. Clearly, Sheppard was thinking about what happened between him and Teyla.

"I know. I am sorry for the pain she inflicted on you John. I was powerless to stop anything of it." Teyla looked at John a little sadly.

"I know it wasn't your fault Teyla." John said reassuringly.

"I am sorry all the same. It was as if I was in my body, but I had no control or power over it." Teyla looked away from Sheppard to look down at Torren next to her in the bed, her hand gently stroking him.

"So you have some memories of what happened then?" Sheppard asked Teyla and Ronon thought for a moment he detected something in Sheppard's voice other than the casually asked question. Ronon saw Teyla frowned.

"Yes, I… I think remember almost everything that happened. Some memories are a little foggy though." Teyla was looking up at Sheppard. There was a certain flush to her cheeks. Sheppard was staring at Teyla, is mouth slightly opened. Sheppard's cheeks did seem to be getting redder by the minute. He sensed there was something underlining going on between Sheppard and Teyla.

It was clear to him something happened between Sheppard and Teyla in that room when that entity in Teyla's body was torturing Sheppard for the computer codes. When he had opened the door to the room, Teyla had been standing over Sheppard. He had automatically stunned her. Then when he went over to Teyla to check if she was alright, feeling for her pulse as Sheppard was voicing his gratitude for his rescue. It was pretty hard not to miss Sheppard disheveled clothes and appearance and the evidence of Sheppard's body arousal to whatever was going on between him and Teyla before he came in. It had appeared there had been some intimate touching between him and Teyla, at any rate, the entity using Teyla's body besides having his mind probed by the entity. And Sheppard hadn't been too forthcoming with a great many details of what exactly happened between him and Teyla yet. Other than the fact that the entity was a telepath and she was able to read his mind using Teyla's gifts along with trying to use Teyla's body to get what she wanted. Sheppard hadn't elaborated even with McKay order to talk about what happened. He had kept quiet too. He figured there would be a few things that Sheppard would have left out of his mission report.

So far it hadn't seemed as if the other women who had been affected had any of the gifts that Teyla had. And there had been concerns of what details the women would remember from their ordeal. Most of the women seem to be fine, but Teyla had been the exception. Since it was apparent that Teyla remembered whatever happened between her and Sheppard and both of them seem uncomfortable about. He suspected things were about to get interesting for his two friends. Ronon glanced at Kanaan.

Whether Kanaan could see it, what was going on between Sheppard and Teyla, he wasn't sure. But the Athosian man was observantly watching them. Ronon thought he was too quiet. One could easily forget he was in the room. Ronon saw an emotion flared in Kanaan's eyes. Then quickly vanished because Kanaan was aware of that he was somehow being watched by him he thought.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

I just want to thank you guys who have left me a review for this fic. As you know this fic was inspired by one of my favorite writers. RL has been extremely busy and complicated. I'm finally in the process of moving. And I am really looking forward to settling down and to do some writing in the near future. It is not that I haven't written anything it is just that I haven't been able to give it the attention I would like along with the moments when my inspiration as seem to have taken leave. I just hope I do her story justice.

**Chapter 2**

Standing in line, waiting patiently as the scientist ahead of him added another piece of food to his tray. John took the time to survey the room briefly. The room was busy with people. Things were finally getting back to normal as normal as things can get here on Atlantis he thought. Still he'll say it was normal. All of the women were finally backed to their normal selves, and that was a good thing. The entities from the Ancient temple that took over their bodies were all now gone, their shapeless, non corporal forms returned to the Temple to cause havoc on unsuspecting journeymen who would enter the Temple and even with their discussions and attempt of putting up some kind of warning for those journeymen, John knew because of man's nature that warning would not be heeded.

But for him this was the only thing that felt normal for him right now though. Having is mind probed by that alien entity that took over Teyla was fast becoming the easy part. It wasn't a torture that left his body battered, bloodied or bruise, no there were no scarring to see on his face or any surfaces of his skin to evidence that experience. The physical torture that the entity had subjected him, now paled in comparison to the emotions he found himself dealing with. No the scarring went deeper. His seemingly already complicated life had gotten more complicated, his world had been thrown off its axis, the aftershocks were still being felt because his torturer was a telepath.

The entity had chosen instead to use his thoughts, his feelings, and Teyla's thoughts and feelings for their sick game. The entity had used their feelings while using Teyla's body to try to gain the information from him; words tauntingly used while using Teyla's womanly body to break down his defenses while his mind was being probed.

He felt he hadn't had a moment peace since besides suffering one mother of a headache for a couple of days after the incident, and even though, it had been a few days since the incident, the entity's taunting words couldn't be so easily forgotten. Those words had left a lasting mark on his psyche. Physical scars were for the most part easier to heal, that he was use to, but the emotional ones weren't so easy. Words he had initially hoped were lies by the entity inside Teyla. Lies he had hoped were being used to seduce and taunt him into submission - he knew the truth of, and those truths he was finding that they weren't so easy to ignore or forget.

That imaginary line between him and Teyla had suddenly he knew had become blurred. Gone was the ignorance of not knowing, in its place, awareness, and that awareness was one of those cruelties of love; the cruelest of irony.

_"Would you like to know what she thinks about when he touches her most intimately?" _

_"That she thinks of you?"_

The continuous replaying of those words by the entity kept echoing in his mind. No he finding those words weren't easy for him to stomach, or to forget. That would be too easy. And to add to that, that wasn't the only thing he was finding hard to put out of his mind. He hadn't been a boy of his teens for awhile now, and yet he was starting to feel like one again. Things were much easer when he wasn't aware. When he knew he had to accept certain things about himself and his relationship with Teyla. But after what happened between him and Teyla and seeing Teyla's reaction to him in the Infirmary after he had went to visit her there.

He had received word from the Infirmary that Teyla was regaining consciousness. He had been relieved because Teyla had been unconscious for a while. They had to put Teyla in an induced coma to trick the entity. But his relief had been tapered with his concerns. Concerns of how much Teyla would remember about what happened between them while she had held him captive while the entity had controlled over her mind and body, torturing him to get the emergency codes to the computer system. But when Teyla looked at him, Teyla's eyes had conveyed to him in those brief moments when their eyes met and held; when Teyla looked away, he knew in that moment, she had indeed did remembered what happened between them. There had been a flushed to her cheeks. Teyla had seemed embarrass and unsure.

He knew in that moment that the troubles he had wondered about being far from over when Ronon had come to his rescue became all too real in that moment. He and Teyla both had flashlights shine on their desires that ignorance of their feelings had been set free. Their feelings were now exposed. He was never the one that found it easy to talk about the emotional stuff, but there had been a part of him that suddenly demanded answers. And that had unnerved him. When it came to emotions or feelings, he knew he wasn't good at expressing either and to be suddenly hit with a wide range of conflicting emotions all at once in the Infirmary, all he could do was get out of the Infirmary as fast as he could, with his unanswered questions in tow. He had wondered later if anyone in the Infirmary had picked upon the emotional storm brewing within him. Kanaan's present in the infirmary along with the others at Teyla's bedside had served as if they were living some kind of Shakespearean's tragedy.

**...**

Balancing the tray of food in his hand, John walked out the Commissary onto the balcony. The rays from the morning sun breaking through the cloudy sky, casting an orange rustic tint across the horizon. John suddenly saw Teyla, slowing. Teyla was with Kanaan and Torren at a table to the far left of the entrance of the Commissary. John schooled himself from staring as he walked by, but that didn't stop him from taking a hard look at them before he took a seat at the table with Rodney and Ronon. Completely unaware of his sour expression and the knowing look that Ronon gave him.

Rodney stilled completely unaware of the situation between two of his teammates, seeing John's sour expression. "So what is the problem now?" Rodney asked. John looked confuse at Rodney for a moment.

"Huh, what?"

"Something is wrong." Rodney said to John in between eating bites of food. John's confusion about Rodney's question gave way to his irritation and suspicion.

John eyed Ronon suspiciously. Ronon was the only one that would have any knowledge of what happened between him and Teyla. Did Ronon tell Rodney? Now, that was something he didn't see happening or coming, but right now he didn't know what to think. He was looking at Ronon suspiciously now. And Ronon certainly didn't look at all phase by the accusatory glance he was giving him. In fact, the corners of Ronon's mouth were curved into a smile. Ronon looked down right smug looking back at him which he finding even more annoying.

"Otherwise you wouldn't be looking like that." Rodney said drawing hiss attention and thoughts away from Ronon and back to Rodney. John looked at Rodney squarely.

"How, am I looking Rodney?" John asked a little bitingly.

"Ah, mm…." Rodney seemed to ponder for a moment then clicking the tips of two of his fingers together then pointing. "Well since you ask. You look like a volcano that is about to blow your top or is it stack. You have been in a foul mood for days.

"Rodney! There is nothing wrong."

John heard himself said the words, but that wasn't exactly the truth was it. Then he found himself looking at the table where Teyla sat with Kanaan and Torren. The emotional storm in him hadn't been abated. It was tainted by a growing frustration. He had long questioned silently Kanaan's present in Teyla's life although he hadn't analyzed before why he questioned that presence. He had been resigned to one of life twisted fates where the boy looses the girl of his dream scenario. It wasn't as if he had told Teyla about his feelings. It wasn't as if he acted on his feelings either. Except for that time when he was infected by Ellia and the retrovirus began to alter his DNA and he had kissed Teyla. And he and Teyla had both been willing not to make an issue of it. He had been relieved, but there was a certain moment of this disappointment.

Now, it had been a couple of days since he had saw Teyla in the Infirmary. He had first tried to avoid Teyla. Then it had dawn on him that Teyla was doing the same thing too. Teyla was actually avoiding him too. That realization of Teyla's avoidance had been a little stinging to him, and had stroke the timbers of his anger because it was further confirmation of what the entity had said. Some of his anger, he knew he was directing at himself, but some of that anger was directed at Teyla. To Teyla, for the choices she had made and was still making. He knew his anger may not be all that rational, but these certainly weren't rational circumstances.

But things were different now. Before he hadn't thought that Teyla thought of him in that way and now that he knew differently. That awareness that now existed between him and Teyla, had given rise to a want that he hadn't allow to give much presence to before. He wanted Teyla. And he didn't want Kanaan any where near Teyla, much less putting his hands to touch her. But right he had to dictate to Teyla who she couldn't be with.

**...**

Teyla knew she and John had been avoiding each other. She also knew that she and John would need to speak to one another about what happened between them. After waking up in the Infirmary, the memories of what happened between her and John when she was being controlled by that entity, those memories had been a part of her. She could see the questioning and apprehension in John's eyes when he looked at her. A part of her had felt ashamed, too ashamed of so many things in those moments. She had been ashamed at what that thing in her almost did to John. She had felt John's pain as the entity had tried to probe his mind for the computer codes. She had felt the entity's sadist glee in enjoying the pain she was inflicting on John. The sadistic things that entity inside her had said to John – as it used her body to entice and seduced him. She had been powerful less to stop any of it.

Her mind and body had not been her own. She had been a spectator in her own body as the entity used her body to enticed, seduced and taunted John. She could feel her own body's physical response to John's body as her own body had been pressed up against John's body intimately - the evident of his arousal pressing against her as she sat astride of him. There had been a certain part of her; her heart that the entity had no control over that had glorified in that new found knowledge. That John Sheppard wanted her; and had always wanted her in some way. But then to hear the entity mouthed those words.

_"Would you like to know what she thinks about when he touches her most intimately?" _

_"That she thinks of you?"_

Was devastating, not because the words were not true, but how true the words were. She had been most ashamed of that.

Those words had stirred something in her. They had sent her down a path of soul searching. So she had taken a couple of days to think. She had questions of her own. Until she founded the answers, she felt it was wise to stay away from John. She hadn't known what to feel with such knowledge and if the truth to be told she still didn't. Knowing John's feelings still didn't tell her why he never told her. And if it wasn't for what happened between them, she suspected she would never have known.

This talk with Kanaan should have been a long time coming, but in her quest to stay true to her culture for her son and to give her son the parents she thought he deserved and needed. Maybe this need was born from her losing her family at such a young age especially her mother. So she had tried to build a life with Kanaan. But it was a life devoid of a love that was passionate in its intensity. She cared for Kanaan, but not the way it should be between lovers. To hear the entity say those words had made her take a hard look at her decisions concerning Kanaan and herself. It wasn't fair to Kanaan. It wasn't fair to her, to want them to live a life, where her heart was at odds with her mind. How could she expect them to be happy? When she had not been happy herself, she had been living in a veil of self denial. She had allowed the logical reasoning of her mind to dictate over her heart.

**...**

"Kanaan, there are some things I wish to discuss with you that is all and now is not the appropriate place or time." She motioned to the various tables filled with people.

"Would this discussion have anything to do with Colonel Sheppard, Teyla? And your feelings for him?"

Teyla was taken back by Kanaan's sharp questioning response. She looked at Kanaan assessing, for a moment. She could see a stirring of emotions, in the dark brown depth of Kanaan's eyes. She could sense and feel a mixture of emotions coming from Kanaan.

TBC


End file.
